World Cup 2026: Italy fighting to avoid another ‘apocalyptic’ qualification failure

Italy won the European Championship in 2021, but have not played at a World Cup finals since 2014 when they beat England but lost to Costa Rica and Uruguay and failed to make it beyond the group phase.

Their 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign could not have got off to a worse start.

A tame 3-0 loss in their opener against Norway, with Manchester City’s Erling Haaland scoring one of the goals, led to manager Luciano Spalletti publicly announcing his own sacking two days later, though he still took charge of the following 2-0 home win over Moldova.

From then on, Italy have been playing catch-up, with flawless Norway winning their opening seven qualifiers, scoring 33 goals in the process, including 14 for Haaland.

Italy turned to Gennaro Gattuso, a former combative midfielder who helped AC Milan twice win the Champions League and Italy secure their last World Cup trophy in 2006.

Despite managing AC Milan and then winning the Coppa Italia with Napoli, a 23-day spell at Fiorentina saw him leave without taking charge of a game, before he only lasted seven months at Valencia and five months at Marseille.

His most recent appointment had been with Croatian club Hajduk Split, and many felt him becoming Italy manager was a mistake.

“When I heard Gattuso was in line it just seemed to demonstrate the giant collapse of Italy,” Italian football journalist Mina Rzouki told the Euro Leagues podcast.

“There were so many clips going around on social media about that Italy team just before they won the World Cup and you are talking about Paolo Maldini, [Fabio] Cannavaro, [Alessandro] Nesta, [Francesco] Totti, [Alessandro] Del Piero and it was just an embarrassment of riches.

“Now when you look at Italy over the last few seasons, even though they won the Euros, there was just a fall – but the one thing you could rely on was that Italy created these great coaches. Yet none of these great coaches were called up or have succeeded. Spalletti did not succeed.”

Horncastle added: “The players have had their backs against the wall after losing to Norway in June and now the approach that is being imposed on Italy by the Italian media is ‘you have to win all your remaining games and have to score lots and lots of goals’.

“Italy had a great coach in Luciano Spalletti, although, for whatever reason, it didn’t work out. Gattuso is a more famous manager for his press conferences than the football he has put on the pitch.”

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